By Ravi Bhalla
At a moment when New Jersey Transit is facing a massive fiscal cliff deficit and without an adopted, dedicated funding source, one would think that the state would prioritize a multibillion-dollar injection into our buses, trains and mass transit infrastructure.
Sound too good to be true? Unfortunately, it is in fact too good to be true.
The reality? Gov. Murphy is instead moving ahead with a misguided and harmful $10.7 billion widening of the Turnpike Extension, an approach to transportation planning that prioritizes cars and over mass transit.
Doubling the size of the Turnpike Extension through Bayonne and the heart of Jersey City without any expansion of the Holland Tunnel is the definition of poor public policy that has little public benefit and will cause real harm to local neighborhoods in Hudson County. Prior history, dating back to the Robert Moses era, repeatedly demonstrates that widening highways invites more cars to use roadways, which increases the amount of traffic.
The concept of“induced demand,” documented by transportation planners and engineers for decades, proves that once roads are widened drivers adapt, with new lanes eventually filling to capacity. In fact, experts from Rutgers and Cornell have projected an increase of 100,000 miles driven on a daily basis if this project were to be completed — a shocking projection that only demonstrates the shortsightedness of the proposal.
The environmental impacts of widening of the Turnpike while ignoring the needs of NJ Transit would be highly devastating to Hudson County residents. It’s not a hard concept to comprehend: more lanes result in more cars, which result in more harmful carbon emissions exposed to residents living along the Turnpike corridor. And on the heels of the NJ Transit fare hike, which will raise the cost of riding a train or bus to 30% in six years in a county that depends on mass transit, this choice will only push even more people to drive, resulting in more carbon emissions and congestion at a time we should be encouraging residents to utilize mass transit.
At the local level in Hoboken, we’ve made significant investments in alternative uses of transportation and transit infrastructure, with the goal of reducing dependence on cars. We joined Jersey City in 2021 to adopt Citi Bike, providing an important first-mile, last-mile option to get to and from transit hubs including Hoboken Terminal. We made our city-run HOP bus service that drops off residents throughout the city free of charge. And we passed a redevelopment agreement to create hundreds of units of housing adjacent to Hoboken Terminal that eliminated parking minimums to encourage tenants to use mass transit. State officials would be wise to adopt this transit-oriented mindset with our state-run transportation projects.
There’s no denying that beyond the local level, certain roads and bridges require attention, but we must approach these projects thoughtfully and cost-effectively. For example, an engineering report commissioned by the NJ Turnpike Authority itself estimated the cost of safely maintaining the Newark Bay Bridge at $260 million – a far cry from the cost of an entirely new wider bridge, which is estimated to have at least a $6.3 billion price tag ($2 billion more than the new Tappan Zee Bridge across the Hudson River).
Reinforcing the infrastructure of certain, targeted bridges and infrastructure in need of rehabilitation is needed. But pouring $10.7 billion into an unwanted, unneeded and counterproductive highway expansion makes no sense.
It is my strong hope that elected officials at all levels of government will embrace sustainable transportation solutions that prioritize mass transit and alternatives to driving, without wasting billions of taxpayer dollars on foolhardy highway expansions.
Ravi Bhalla is the mayor of Hoboken. He is seeking the Democratic nomination in the June primary for New Jersey’s 8th district Congressional seat.
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